Jonathan Kuminga’s second preseason outing for the Minnesota Timberwolves was the kind that puts his shot selection right back under the microscope.
Against the Indiana Pacers on Wednesday night at Hilton Coliseum, Kuminga managed only two points in less than 19 minutes. He shot 1-of-9 from the floor and missed all three of his 3-point attempts in Minnesota’s 123-112 loss.
That line mattered because Kuminga is no longer being asked to drift along as a young piece on the edge of a contender. He has a starting role on a team trying to get back to the Western Conference Finals and beyond, after signing a two year, $12.4 million contract in free agency. There is far less margin for the messy stretches that have followed him before.
The core issue with Kuminga has always been the same one: finding the right balance. Minnesota head coach Chris Finch has already pushed him to stay aggressive, and that makes sense.
When Kuminga is attacking with force, he looks like the scorer his game promises. That is his best trait when it is pointed in the right direction.
But he is also operating in an offense where he is not the centerpiece. Those touches belong to franchise superstar Anthony Edwards and offseason arrival LaMelo Ball. On Wednesday, Kuminga took as many shots as Ball and one fewer than Edwards, even though he played less and was far less efficient.
He also finished as the only Timberwolves starter with a negative plus minus. The shot chart told part of the story, with several contested looks mixed in with defensive mistakes that Finch and the staff will not want carrying into the regular season.
Kuminga’s career has already been shaped by this exact problem. In Golden State, Steve Kerr could not quite get consistent value from him as a complementary player, even though Kuminga regularly flashed the talent of a high-end scorer. The Warriors were never going to hand over the primary offensive load from Stephen Curry and Jimmy Butler to the younger forward.
After leaving Golden State in February, Kuminga landed with the Atlanta Hawks, who used him more as a bucket-getting sixth man. They clearly did not view that role as worth the $24.3 million team option he initially held for this season, and he eventually reached free agency without finding that kind of deal elsewhere.
Now the task is bigger than simply putting up numbers in spurts. Kuminga has to show that the Warriors and Hawks were wrong, and that he can be a real starting-level player on a legitimate playoff team. If Wednesday was any indication, even in preseason, that is going to take more than raw talent.
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The harder part is sorting out how his status could ripple beyond rehab. There is already speculation from one Bleacher Report writer about a possible Butler trade to the New Orleans Pelicans, a reminder that his name can still pull the conversation in multiple directions even while he recovers. Nothing along those lines has been confirmed, but it is the kind of idea that keeps a decision like this from feeling routine, especially for a Warriors team watching the entire situation unfold from a distance. [Read more 🡒]